For the past several years there has been considerable debate as to the desirability and efficacy of installing an automatically inflatable airbag passenger restraint system in automotive vehicles. Both the proponents and opponents of such system rely on estimates of the severity of crashes involving such vehicles. Unfortunately, however, there is a lack of reliable data relating to the severity of crashes of the kind experienced in circumstances other than those involving carefully controlled and monitored test crashes. Test crashes, however, rarely conform to actual, accidental crashes. It has been proposed, therefore, to provide vehicles with crash recorders capable of measuring acceleration. Statistical analyses, such as one conducted by the University of Utah, have indicated that approximately three million such crash recorders would be required to obtain statistically significant crash data in a reasonable period of time. The cost of crash recorders available heretofore, however, even in large volume production, is so great that the use of such crash recorders is prohibitive.
A principal object of this invention is to provide an extremely reliable crash recorder capable of being manufactured at a small fraction of the cost of recorders heretofore known, thereby making it financially feasible to equip vehicles with crash recorders.